2 Last night I mean.
3 Oh, I got off work and then mailed my late taxes.
4 I ate at some lousy Pho place. They didn't even have meatballs.
5 They were across the street from the post office.
6 I was lucky with my life on crossing that one.
7 I had me a bowl of pho on a hot day. Nobody cared.
8 Evil ran amok.
9 I got home late, because I stayed at school like I was told.
10 I mailed my taxes AT the post office, even though I tried other arenas.
11 I had pho from a strange pho place, not that there are any unstrange pho places.
12 By the time I got home I fell zombielike into the proverbial coma.
13 I fed the dog and crashed famously on my sofa, front door wide open so I could enjoy the gorgeous afternoon.
14 I drifted off for around a half hour when I heard a knocking at my door.
15 Somehow some way some young rapscallion mined his way past Phoebe, my personal guard dog at the gates of Hades.
16 The knocking came from this miscreant's knuckles. He looked like a postal worker, only more eager. He had a postalesque outfit with letters from his company neatly embroidered on his creased shirt.
17 He had a clipboard.
18 I'd seen this fellow in many past lives.
19 Having been knocked out of a deep slumber, I was no ears and all polite.
20 Ever been there?
21 On a normal day I would have interrupted his first three words with, "I'm busy and the dog's upset would you mind?" and closed the door.
22 But I felt tanned, rested and ready.
23 The fellow went on for around six years about how his company (he kept pointing to its embroidered name on his dark blue shirt) was the next big thing in energy conservation.
24 Eventually he ran out of gas and brought out his pen for me to sign up for whatever it was he wanted me to sign.
25 I told him I wasn't interested and to be careful because my dog might take a chunk out of his pants.
26 The guy assured me he was dog-friendly.
27 Phoebe saw him as the Enemy. She stood vigilant.
28 An amiable ally, if you ask this Old Brown Shoe.
29 The fellow finally realized that my pen nor my checkbook were to be of no use to him, and eagerly handed me his card. It had the same logo as the logo on his shirt.
30 As he moved to the gate, Phoebe unleashed her raging terror on him, which consisted of seven barks and a quick nip at his back pocket.
31
32 That's all true.
33 I stood unapologetic, like Socrates.
34
35 No Platonic nonsense.
36 I returned to the couch, clicked on TCM and drifted off.
37 Gone With the Wind played.
38 You can't make this stuff up.
39 Moving On, Part One: I'm writing this fresh.
40 Right after that fellow left I decided I wasn't doing a thing for anyone or anything hereafter.
41 I went to the closet, pulled out a nice comforter and went back to the couch. My plan was to pull the comforter over my head and rule out the world. Sleep befell me, but not without interruption.
42 I thought of grading papers.
43 I thought of planning the rest of the week.
44 I thought of paying bills.
45 I thought of looking at school emails to see if there were any further orders from the day.
46 But then I thought of sleep. <long smile>
47 I thought of the Hamlet quote I usually save for the last day of school. It goes like this:
48 The Rest is Silence.
49 Each year when I am done with everything at school I write those words on the board. They are always the last thing I write.
50 They are Hamlet's last words.
51 The alarm just went off in the other room.
52 Some advertisement just went off in a different window on my computer.
53 The world has awakened and is already nipping at me.
54
55 Know what I did? I did nothing.
56 The rest is silence.
57 Have a GREAT day. Tell the bastards it will have to wait.
58 Fly low.
59 See you again.
60 Peace.
~H~
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